Saturday, July 11, 2009

Workday Saturday

And Two On the Lunge

It took me a while to get outside today as I was occupied with transferring some files on my computer....after the day's stage of the Tour de France was finished. The race is in the Pyrenees, so it's gotten quite interesting. Mountain stages always create a lot of drama.

I went out after I fed the Boys dinner, deciding it was time to clean out under both run-in roofs. The ground has finally dried out, so the tractor would be fine because I wouldn't have to go through the mud. Both sheds had hay mixed with hay, mixed with wet. Chance's side had manure too since he tends to poop outside his stall.

Neither side had had a good good cleaning since winter because of all the rain we've had. This meant a lot of work to get down to the bare dirt. I didn't wear my watch, but even with the tractor, it still took me at least two hours to do the job. The problem is that the hay does not scoop up into the bucket because it tends to roll into big piles I then have to fork into the bucket. I lost track of the number of trips I took.

Once done with that cleaning, I decided to lunge Chance and Tucker.

Once again, Chance looked fine on the line, with no sign of his mysterious lameness. He is barefoot, so the trim Scott did on his hind feet yesterday probably didn' t change things too much as he had already worn the toe on his own before the trim.

Tucker worked well too, but he was ignoring my command to "trot" once he was in the "canter." Toby will kind of get into that kind of mindless cantering too, so it was interesting to see Tucker doing the same thing. I worked him for a while on transitions until once again he was obeying my voice commands.

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About Me

I have been riding for more than 50 years and owned horses since 1971.
I am a retired High School English teacher and a political/environmental activist.
I write fantasy stories/novels and am a soprano choir member and soloist. I have also authored a few songs that have been published and performed.